


Five Times John Childermass Shared Someone Else's Bed (+ One Time Someone Shared His)

by OfShoesAndShips



Series: those of us who are lost and low [3]
Category: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-16
Updated: 2015-11-23
Packaged: 2018-05-02 00:47:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 3,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5227466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OfShoesAndShips/pseuds/OfShoesAndShips
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erm. It's all there in the title, isn't it?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 1796: Norrell

 

  
The knock comes just as he is falling asleep, light and shy; for a second he’s not certain he really heard it, but then one of the floorboards outside his door creaks under the weight of someone turning away, and he calls out to stop them.

 

Still, the door doesn’t open and another knock doesn’t come; Norrell swings out of bed and picks up the candle from the bedside table, padding across the cold floor and opening the door.  Standing there in the dark corridor, without a candle of his own, is John, looking too small and too young - his arms are folded across his chest, and he is dressed only in a nightshirt and his coat, having apparently pressed it into service as a dressing gown.

 

“What is it?” Norrell asks, and then winces at the sharpness of his voice.

 

“I,” he starts, and stops.

 

“Are you well?”

 

John appears to be unsure as to whether shake his head or not.

 

Norrell steps back and holds the door open, and John rushes in, as if he fears being shouted at if he’s too slow.

 

“Sit down,” Norrell says, very quietly, and John collapses on the side of the bed Norrell hadn’t been occupying.

 

“Couldn’t sleep,” John murmurs, as Norrell slips back under the blankets.

 

“Ah.”

 

“Aren’t you going to ask about-;” he falters.

 

“Do you want me to?”

 

John shakes his head.

 

“Well then.”

 

John laughs, and turns to look at him. He blushes very slightly and turns away again.

 

“What is it?”

 

There is a long pause. “May I stay?”

 

“Of course.”

 

John sighs, standing up and pulling off his coat before sliding under the sheets. “I’m still not-;” he starts, and Norrell nods.

 

“I gathered.”

 

John sighs and tugs the sheets up, holding himself still, tension in every line of him, as if they have never shared a bed before. As if he does not sleep in this bed more than he does in his own. But then, Norrell realises, they haven’t shared a bed before, not on days like this. Not on days when the thing between them softens, becoming delicate and fragile and quiet - not quite one thing, not quite the other.

 

Norrell reaches out to him, touching one hand to his arm; John blinks at him, and then his breath leaves him in a gust and he comes closer, tucking himself against Norrell’s chest. Norrell’s hand tightens in the fabric of John’s shirt, and the steady rise and fall of John’s chest stutters for a second. Norrell relaxes his grip instantly, ready for him to pull away, but feels John shaking his head.

 

“It’s not that,” he says, his voice muffled by fabric and skin, and Norrell puts his arm back around John’s shoulder.

 

They shift a little, as the darkness and the warmth soothes a little of the awkwardness away, and fall asleep tangled up, held safe in one another’s arms.

 

\--

 

There is no flinching, that morning. John rolls away and yawns into his wrist, squeezes Norrell’s hand that flies out after him, stands up, and becomes Childermass as soon as he shrugs his coat on.

 

“I’m off to York,” he says, and while he doesn’t sound as soft as he does some days, there is no distance in his voice, no brittleness.

 

Norrell blinks at him, still half asleep; and then he nods, pushing his way further into the pillow. By the darkness of the room it must be before dawn; so he has some hours yet before he ought to wake.

 

Childermass laughs, an easy, warm sound. “I’ll see you later.”

 

Norrell mumbles a goodbye into the pillow and Childermass laughs again, heading for the door. But he pauses just before opening it, and Norrell frowns, pushing himself up a little.

  
“Thank you,” Childermass says, without looking at him, and slips out into the corridor.


	2. 1815: Jeremy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thanks be to Bookhobbit for betaing and for sympathising while I yelled about Jeremy.

 

 

He’s sat in a corner of the pub when Jeremy steps inside - sat opposite a slightly sceptical young barmaid with his cards spread out on the table between them. He’s obviously already pretty deep in his cups, else he wouldn’t be reading to start with; and besides, when he spots Jeremy he waves, cheerfully. It’s so entirely unlike him that Jeremy pauses for a moment just to be sure it is actually him.

 

But it is him, and he gestures to the cards and the sceptical young barmaid with a slight raising of one eyebrow, so Jeremy hangs back until he’s done and the barmaid walks away looking a great deal less sceptical and a great deal more shaken.

 

“Terrorising barmaids with your drunk prescience, Childermass?” Jeremy asks as he sits down.

 

“For your information Johns, I’m not drunk yet.”

 

“An easily remedied misfortune,” Jeremy says, gesturing to another barmaid for drinks.

 

Childermass snorts. “So what are you doing in the backend of nowhere?”

 

Jeremy grins. “Same as you, I reckon.”

 

“Books?”

 

“Books.”

 

Childermass smiles wryly and leans back. “How’d you fancy settling this ‘n?”

 

The barmaid comes then with a pint of ale for both of them and Jeremy takes a long swig before answering. “After what happened in Ripon, why don’t we just see how it goes?”

 

Childermass shrugs. “It’s all the same to me.”

 

“Well it’s you who’ll be lying to your master when we’re back in London, so on your head be it.”

 

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” Childermass says, holding his pint glass in both hands and smirking in his sideways way.

 

Jeremy laughs.

 

\--

 

Several drinks later and Jeremy is beginning to waver, very slightly. Childermass is leaning forward heavily on the table, pushing it a little, and looks like he’s only a few minutes from dropping his head down on it and laughing hysterically at himself.

 

“This is what you get for being mercurial,” Jeremy says, and Childermass lifts his head and glares.

 

“We can’t all be steadfast and stubborn. Oh, don’t look so bloody smug, you bastard.”

 

“It’s not me weeping into my pint about how jealous I am of my master’s ex-apprentice.”

 

“I am not _weeping._ ”

 

“That’s what you say,” Jeremy sniffs, and Childermass kicks him under the table.

 

“And I am not _jealous_ of _Jonathan bloody Strange_.”

 

“Ha.” Jeremy says, as dryly as he possibly can.

 

“I’m one of your,” Childermass gestures vaguely, “ _Knitting circle_ or whatever it is, aren’t I?”

 

“Knitting circle?”

 

“You know what I mean.”

 

“I’m afraid I’ve never knitted in my life.”

 

“Piss off. Your,” he gestures again, “Where you take down the name of everyone who’s...not like everyone else, in their...absence of proclivities. Spy ring, knitting circle, whatever it is.”

 

“It’s a wonder you and His Fussiness ever got anything started in the first place if you’re always so round-about.”

 

Childermass groans and drops his head on the table. “I need another drink.”  


\--

 

Jeremy sighs and grabs the stumbling Childermass by the back of his collar. “Stairs are this way, Childermass.”

 

“What?” He looks up at him, frowning, and Jeremy shakes his head, letting go of his collar to take him by the arm and tow him up the stairs.

 

Childermass pulls his arm away. “I don’t need _dragging_ , Johns.”

 

“If you can make it up these stairs without toppling and breaking your neck, then be my guest, but I hardly feel like explaining the matter of your death to your slightly worse half.”

 

“Oi,” Childermass says, but lets himself be dragged the rest of the way up the stairs.

 

\--

 

Jeremy rolls his eyes and sighs when he sees the number of rooms upstairs.

 

“You don’t happen to be able to penetrate that drunken haze enough to recall which room you’re in?”

 

Childermass digs in one pocket and pulls out a card. He frowns at it. “Eight?”

 

Jeremy rolls his eyes again. “Fine, alright, you’re staying with me. Remind me to never let you start on the whisky when you’re already bladdered.”

 

“I am not,” Childermass says as Jeremy digs in his pocket for his key and unlocks the door to his room.

 

“Of course not.” Jeremy gently pushes him inside before closing and locking the door behind them. When he turns back, Childermass has already thrown himself down on the narrow and only reasonably clean bed, not even having stopped to take his shoes off.

 

“You alright there, old man?”

 

Childermass gestures rather rudely at him, and Jeremy laughs, sitting down on the other side of the bed to take his shoes off. He feels the mattress shift as Childermass rolls over, and doesn’t bother to hide his grin as Childermass begins to snore faintly.

 

“You better not keep me awake,” Jeremy whispers as he lies down himself, “Or there’s no way I’m letting you get those books tomorrow.”


	3. 1817: Hannah

He sits on the end of her bed, looking down at his feet; a canteen is clenched tight in one hand, though the lid is still on. She knocks gently on the open door and he jumps, glancing up and then away again. He’s left his coat and jacket somewhere; his sleeves are rolled back and he’s left his shoes off, his stockings rolling down, and his hair hangs loose, hiding his face.

 

“Haven’t seen you for a while,” she says, not quite as harshly as she thinks he’s expecting.

 

He glances up again, and he looks a mess. His eyes are bloodshot and not quite focused, his cheeks almost hollow; she scans him again and realises that his clothes - which never quite fit him - are loose to the point of ridiculousness. Something in her clenches in fear but she pinches her lips together, holding everything in.

 

“Been busy,” he murmurs, his voice rough.

 

She breathes out and steps into the room, approaching him slowly and then sitting beside him on the bed. She considers asking him what he’s been doing, since - but ‘appen that’s why he’s sitting on her bed, exhausted and lost and horribly thin.

 

“When was the last time you ate, John?”

 

He shrugs.

 

“And when did you last sleep?”

 

“Can’t,” he says, “I keep seeing-;” he breaks off, unscrewing the lid of his canteen and taking a long drink. He offers it her and she shakes her head. “He’s gone, Hannah,” he says, suddenly.

 

“Yes.”

 

“Can’t keep ahold of anything, can I?”

 

She sighs. “Johnny-;”

 

He lets out a shuddering gasp and she puts her arm around his back, squeezing him in close. She can feel his ribs even through the thick cloth of his waistcoat, and she presses a kiss to his shoulder.

 

“You’re staying here tonight,” she says, “You’re in no fit state for anything.”

 

“I have things I need to-;”

 

“No you don’t. You’re going to put that canteen down, get into that bed, and try and sleep for a bit while I find you something to eat. And then when you wake back up again I’m going to yell at you for not visiting sooner.”   
  


He laughs weakly and puts his canteen down, standing up as carefully as a man twice his age.  She stands up herself, about to leave, when he reaches out and catches her arm.

 

“John?”

 

“Stay with me?” he whispers, barely loud enough for her to hear, and something in his voice breaks through her careful composure and she tugs him into a hug, sobbing into his shoulder.

 

“Of course. Of course.” She pulls away, taking his face in both hands and pushing herself up on her toes to kiss his forehead. 

 

“Hannah-;”

 

“Shh,” she murmurs, and tugs his waistcoat off, hanging it over the bedstead, “Go on, get in.”

 

Silently he does as he’s told, slipping under the cool bedsheets and curling in on himself. She sits down on the other side, reaching out and stroking his hair away from his face before kicking her shoes off and curling up beside him, just as they’d done when they were children.

 

_ “ Not long, not long, my father said, _

_ Not long shall you be ours, _ ”   she sings, softly, half to him and half to herself.

 

“You sound just like her,” he mumbles.

 

“Excuse you, Johnny boy, Ma Joan couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket.”

 

“Mm, precisely.”

 

She laughs and swats his shoulder, before picking the song back up again.

 

_ “ The Raven King knows all too well, _

_ Which are the fairest flowers…” _


	4. 1820: Vinculus

“This is my bed,” Vinculus says, when Childermass lies back beside him against the trunk of a particularly wizened ash tree. 

 

“Is it ‘eck. Besides, you slept all the way to Gloucester.” Childermass closes his eyes, apparently of the opinion that the conversation is over. 

 

Vinculus, whose position against the ash tree is becoming less and less comfortable by the second, kicks him. 

 

Childermass opens one eye. “Go to sleep.”   
  


“I would, only someone has stolen my bed.”

 

“I hardly thought you’d mind sharing.”

 

“It’s the principle of the thing. I’m perfectly within my rights to complain of a stolen bed-;”

 

“And you’d know all about your rights, wouldn’t you.”   
  


“And you’d know all about stealing, wouldn’t you.”

 

“You’ll watch your tongue.”

 

Vinculus shifts until a knot is no longer digging into his shoulder. “I shan’t. I have the ears of kings now, John Childermass-;”

 

“Oh aye?” 

 

Vinculus kicks him again, which was possibly a bad idea because Childermass kicks him right back a good deal harder.

 

“Ow,” Vinculus says, and Childermass snorts.

 

“If you have the ears of kings,” he says then, “Could you have one of them appear and turn this tree into a feather mattress?”

 

“It’s you who was too tight to get us a room at that inn a few miles back.”

 

“Are you still going on about that?”

 

Vinculus sniffs. “Well, since I’m bloody cold and someone has  _ stolen my bed _ -;”

 

“You’d be warmer if you came a bit closer.”

 

“Oh aye?” Vinculus parrots, in a rather more loaded tone.

 

“Piss off.”

 

“Ah, now you’re sending mixed messages.”

 

“Fine. Piss off, find yourself another tree and freeze to death, see if I care.”

 

Vinculus pouts at him. “Can’t get any sympathy anywhere, these days.”

 

“Just go the hell to sleep.”

 

“Fine manners you have. I’d have thought that master of yours would’ve taught you better.”

 

“Shut your stupid mouth and go to sleep.”

 

Vinculus sniffs, and tries to ignore the cold grass underneath him making his breeches damp.

 

“Some people,” he mutters to himself - though not quite low enough, as Childermass snorts. 

  
He wriggles a bit in an attempt to recover his stolen comfort, gives up, and, fighting it every inch of the way, falls asleep.


	5. 1822: Segundus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've double-posted today, so don't miss Vinculus's chapter!

It is, he reflects, odd. There is, in daylight, a certain snarl in everything that Childermass does and says; a snap in his movements, a sense of being closed off as if he has wrapped himself in thorns and does not even feel their sting so long as they hold others off.

 

But not here. Not in this, in the low light of the candles and still, despite Segundus’s efforts, with the smell of dust in the air. The thorns had not stung him as he stepped in close, as he raised one hand to trace the faint line of Childermass’s scar, as he leaned in and kissed that mouth, no longer so stubbornly set.

 

No, they had not stung him. But given the delicacy of Childermass’s touch, how tentatively he kissed back, he felt perhaps Childermass had not been so lucky. In his every breath there is a catch, and his hands settle strangely against Segundus’s skin, as if he expects a different shape beneath his hands.

 

“I am not what you want,” he whispers as he pulls away.

 

“I beg to differ,” Segundus says, cradling his face in both hands, “You are everything I want.”

 

“Then you are a fool.”

 

Segundus smiles. “Quite so,” he says, leaning back in. He kisses him with a little more insistence, and for a second Childermass relaxes into him; his hands tighten on Segundus’s hips, and he moans a little when Segundus’s fingers twist into his hair - but it does not last. He breaks away, not letting go but dropping his head, breathing a little too fast and a little too shakily.

 

“John?” Segundus whispers, feeling that name against his tongue for the first time and hoping he was right to. But Childermass shakes his head, a tight, small movement, and Segundus strokes one hand across his shoulder in what he hopes is reassurance. “Childermass?” he asks, instead, and Childermass raises his head to look at him.

 

There is a hollowness in Childermass’s eyes that fair freezes him to the spot. 

 

“When I get my hands on whoever has hurt you so terribly I swear-;” 

 

Childermass’s expression collapses. “Do not speak of that which you do not understand,” he whispers, fiercely but not coldly.

 

Segundus takes a step back and lets go of him. “I am sorry, I didn’t mean-;”

 

Childermass follows, and rests one slightly shaking hand against Segundus’s cheek. “I know,” he says, so close that Segundus can feel his breath, “I know.”

 

Segundus presses forward that last, miniscule distance and kisses the corner of his mouth. “Well then,” he whispers, taking hold of Childermass’s waist and pulling him slowly towards the bed, “Shall we?”

 

Childermass goes very still. “You know I am not-;”

 

“I know.” 

 

He breathes out. “Alright.”

 

_

 

It is, he reflects, odd. Strange to have this almost-sleepy calmness without what goes before, to lie a hair’s-breadth from someone and feel that it is allowed, to feel that it is neither prelude nor afterthought. Stranger still, how Childermass has curled against him, as if he is seeking protection, sanctuary, in the curve of Segundus’s body. But he had done it without fuss, without awkwardness, as if he already knew how to surround himself with a body so much smaller than his.

 

Segundus is not an idiot. He can put facts together and make a theory from them, and so he feels that he knows who it was that Childermass would curl against, knows whose shape Childermass’s hands had expected - knows, too, who has shattered him so completely, but he sees no sense in tainting this. Segundus tightens his arm around Childermass’s chest, pulling him in closer and pressing a kiss to his hair. Childermass’s breath hitches, apparently in pain, but when he raises his head, there is no suggestion that he has been crying - he does not even look like he is about to. But he does look as if he very much wants to, and Segundus feels something in him shatter.

 

Childermass must see it in his face, because he kisses him, achingly tender. 

 

“Sh,” he whispers, “It’s alright. It’s alright.”


	6. 1828: +1

 

“Good morning, my dear,” Norrell whispers, barely loud enough for Childermass to hear, and Childermass blinks, exhaustion still weighing heavy on him.

 

Norrell is curled tightly against him, both of them squeezed into Childermass’s narrow bed, and looks to have been awake for a while; there is a redness on his cheek, not quite a bruise and unlikely to be one, but still. Childermass reaches out to trace it, looking at Norrell in confusion.  


“You lash out in your sleep more than you used to,” Norrell says, far more gently than Childermass thinks he’s ever heard.

 

Childermass pulls away like he’s been burnt.

 

Norrell shakes his head. “I’m not hurt.”

 

“You could have been,” he whispers, and Norrell catches his trembling hand, pressing it gently to his lips.

 

“And you are not?”

 

Childermass freezes up and stares at him. “What’ve they told you?”

 

Norrell looks as if he’s about to reply, but seems to think better of it, taking Childermass’s hand in a loose grip and just looking at him.

 

At that touch, Childermass makes a soft, wounded noise and tightens his grip for the slightest of moments.

 

“I am quite well,” Norrell says, “I would have you be so, too.”

 

Slowly, the tension slides out of him and he bows his head; they are so closely squeezed together that the movement presses his forehead to their lightly clasped hands, and the warmth of Norrell’s skin is enough to scrape him raw.

 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers.

 

“It is I who need apologise.”

 

“You didn’t hit me in your sleep.”

 

“But I hurt you.”

 

Childermass takes a deep breath. “Yes,” he says.

 

“I am sorry for it.”

 

“Yes,” he repeats, too scared of his own shattering to say anything else; Norrell seems to know, and pulls him closer anyway.

 

Childermass slips his hand from Norrell’s, clutching at the fabric of his nightshirt instead and feeling the steady rise and fall of his ribs; his own breath catches and Norrell curves his palm around the back of Childermass’s head, drawing tiny circles with his fingertips.

 

His eyes prick with tears and he drags in a breath full of Norrell’s scent, warm skin and soap and the firecrackle of his magic. It doesn’t help, but Norrell rests his other hand on Childermass’s shaking shoulders and somehow, somehow, that makes it alright.

 

In the back of his head, there is a voice telling him he is being ridiculous, that sanctuary is no more likely to be found here, in this too-small bed in this too-big room, held together by hands that have hurt him so terribly once before, than it is to be found anywhere else.

 

And yet.

 

And yet here he is twenty-five again, soothed out of a nightmare by a quiet, steady presence, and he is eighteen, shivering and shaken and sitting across from a man who shouldn’t be able to save him but does, and he is twenty-eight, breathing in the dark beside someone who knows, who understands, and he is thirty-five, feeling the earth change under him and seeking that stability again for what could so easily have been the last time.

 

“I grieved for you,” he whispers, and Norrell draws a carefully steady breath, pressing his face into Childermass’s hair.

 

“I know.”

 


End file.
